On 22 March 1954, Andrew Dingwall, a 50-year-old newsagent was murdered by 19-year-old Patrick Joseph Platts who violently stabbed Dingwall 17 times and slashed his throat during a bungled robbery of Dingwall's newsagency in Mount Morgan, Queensland.
Dingwall had attempted to confront Platts after he caught him trespassing on his premises before Platts used a sheath knife to fatally stab Dingwall in a frenzied attack before escaping in a taxi to Rockhampton and throwing the weapon into the river from the Fitzroy Bridge.
On 19 May 1954, Platts was convicted by a jury of wilful murder and sentenced to life imprisonment with hard labour at Stuart Creek Gaol near Townsville.
On 11 June 1955, Platts escaped from the gaol with fellow inmate Stanley Gordon Taylor, prompting a widespread search. They were both eventually recaptured, but their escape prompted an inquiry into the administration of Stuart Creek Gaol.
Murder of Dingwall
Dingwall was found dead with a slashed throat and 17 stab wounds by a customer at around 6:30am on 22 March 1954 at the rear of his newsagency in Morgan Street where he usually slept on a mattress. The time of death was estimated to have occurred at around 3:00am.
Dingwall was born in Brisbane on 7 October 1903 to Andrew and Mollie Frances Dingwall. He served with the Citizen Military Force during World War II, having enlisted in Kununoppin in Western Australia. He had moved to Mount Morgan six years prior to his murder having formerly been a manager of a newsagency in Toowoomba where he lived for about 12 months.
After his death, he was buried in a cemetery in Toowong during a small graveside service. It was reported that only six mourners attended, including his elderly mother, despite his funeral notice being published in newspapers.
Dingwall's sister Helen Carberry said that he had been planning to retire and had been attempting to sell the Mount Morgan newsagency for about a year. She lamented that if Dingwall had accepted some of the earlier offers he had received for the newsagency, he would have probably still been alive and living in Western Australia in retirement.
Carberry described her brother as a shy and retiring person who didn't consume alcohol, smoke cigarettes, use profanity or pursue romantic relationships. She also said a decision was made to tell their elderly mother only that her son had died but not that he had been murdered due to concerns about how she would react to such news.
Search for killer
Police immediately commenced a search for the killer and issued appeals to the public on local radio and in local newspapers regarding a suspect who had travelled from Mount Morgan to Rockhampton in a taxi shortly after the murder took place.
Detectives immediately flew from Brisbane to Rockhampton to join the investigation.
The search for the killer was hampered by a number of incidents of people falsely identifying themselves as investigation officers.
An extensive search was undertaken in Brisbane for an armed scar-faced man with a bandaged arm who caught a taxi while claiming to be a detective from Longreach involved with the case. This led to police questioning more than a dozen men with bandaged arms in Brisbane. The police eventually concluded that the bandaged man had no connection with the Dingwall murder.
Another man was arrested and charged with having assumed the designation of a detective while not being member of the police force after questioning men at the Gresham Hotel in Rockhampton. The 32-year-old West Australian man who had been working on a road construction site near Marlborough pleaded guilty, was convicted and fined £3.
Arrest of Platts
After what was described as "one of the most intensive manhunts in Queensland history", police rushed to Alpha on 30 March 1954 after discovering what was described as a "promising lead".
Patrick Joseph Platts was found on 31 March 1954 near Alpha in Central West Queensland where he had been working.
Although from Mount Morgan, Platts had spent several years in the Alpha district, most recently having been employed as a labourer in a fencing gang for about two years. Police officers from Longreach and Alpha discovered Platts living in a camp 20 miles from Alpha and were joined by detectives who had travelled from Mount Morgan.
During their investigation, police discovered Platts had left Alpha on 18 March 1954 to travel to Rockhampton and had returned on 27 March 1954.